Since this was also a morale-boosting trip giving regular servicemembers cookies, coffee, and a chance to talk on the radio, I wouldn't have any problem with it if it weren't that the rhetoric of so many trip-supporters was as heated as Iraq in July.

My favorite example from the Radio Equalizer: "The onslaught really became personal, as [KSFO-AM/San Francisco morning host Melanie] Morgan's news credentials were attacked and one site begged Iraqi terrorists to kidnap the group."

Said "site" was actually a discussion in which one of 62 posts said: "I hope the insurgency, er, freedom fighters are taking notes and planning a kidnaping or two." Five other posts compared the tour to This Is Spinal Tap, so you know just how serious they were.

Wasn't it really about the left going bananas over the purpose of this trip, calling it propaganda? FOX News ran a lengthy story, with an array of charges made by critics.What bothered me was that many of the hosts paid their own way, in one case $20,000 out-of-pocket and deserved a little more respect. Instead, they got the Rove treatment, with accusations the group was in cahoots with the administration.

Pilecki is very kind to point out the morale-boosting aspect of the journey, which I'd never seen mentioned by anyone on the left side of the spectrum.

As for the personal attacks on KSFO's Melanie Morgan, they were well-documented and refuted by Michelle Malkin here.

Pilecki believes I've somehow been wrong to pin on a website, what's contained in its comments section. To me, the point is that the outrageous discussion has taken place, not whether the site's author was behind it.

Can it really be chalked up to one reader's crazy comment?

It's not quite that simple, it turns out. The hate rhetoric began with the first of 62 messages at the lefty Smirking Chimp site, featuring the headline "Attention All Iraqi Kidnappers", followed by the FOX News story mentioned above.

A number of subsequent comments from readers focus on whether the hosts would or should be physically harmed, seeming to hope it would happen:

Who are the big names on the itinerary?

I hope the insurgency, er, freedom fighters are taking notes and planning a kidnaping or two. Hannity or Coulter begging for their lives would be something to see.

Exhibit "B" (with language editing):

I hope some of the troops beat the f**king s**t out of them.

Thats what I hope.

"C":

Although the idiot "journalists" going on this junket whine that they're paying their own way, WE will be paying for their protection while they're over there in the form of our tax dollars. How I wish I had the connections to arrange a kidnapping or two.

How about "D" (language editing mine):

I hate to think this, I really do. But after reading this so-called "feedback" from the Safe, er...Green Zone, I'm convinced the only thing that's going to shut these deluded f**kers up is for a crate of pipe bombs to detonate right inside their air conditioned housing unit.

I take that back...please make this happen during one of their skinny-dipping ("I won’t tell if you won’t!"), Fallijah-Fizz sessions!

As for the Spinal Tap "satire", it's confined to just a few of the messages and isn't a key aspect of the discussion.

Meanwhile, the hate speech in the above posts isn't challenged even once, in fact, others add to it, in subsequent comments.

How angry must you be to wish this kind of harm on your political opponents? And why the need to downplay hate-filled rhetoric on your own side of the fence?

7 Comments:

Let's face it, folks. Liberals are in a serious desperation mode. AND,it will get worse. They are so devoid of any real ideas, have been since Hillary tried to force her "healthcare" on us.The Bush administration has been scandal free, unlike our previous president. They've tried to make Karl Rove a Scandal. It ain't washing. Iraq, even with it's problems, has still been far to successful for the liberals to stomach. WW3 is about to happen now with the nomination by President Bush of John G. Roberts, jr. We won't hear anything BUT attacks about this man. Character assasination is the only card the liberals know how to play.I smell more seats in the senate and house for the GOP in '06!

Bush:1.) immmoral war based on trumped up intelligence and lies that leads Iraq to a civil war.2.) unprecedented federal intervention in personal family matters.3.) unprecedented attempt to manipulate the public through fake town hall meetings and the payrolling of pundits like Armstong Williams and James Gannon.

I agree that the using quotes from the comments section of blogs should not be used by credible pundits from either the left or the right for the purposes of making an argument unless the person leaving the commment is known to the pundit or the public.

Christ will the dumb asses in the Democratic Party never get it. ABC News did an interview with Ben Laden in 1999. He was offerred santcuary in Iraq, bases in Iraq, WMDs from Iraq. Iraq was the place where Carlos the Jackal, Abu Nidal, Abu Abasas and other assorted Terrorists were based.

There was cooperation. If Bush had not acted and another 911 attack had occured he would have been impeached and for good reason. For not doing what that Coward Bill Clinton would not do. Stand up to the Terrorists thugs who murdered people in Bali, Breslan, Madrid, Istanbul, Beirut, Ankara, London, Manilla, NYC, DC and elsewhere.